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Nitish home district clocks world record in potato yield

Patna, Apr 1, 2012, (PTI)

Close on the heels of achieving highest paddy production globally, Darvespura village in Nalanda district of Bihar has added another first to its name by setting a world record in potato yield.

A farmer, namesake of Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, of Darvespura village in Nalanda district, has harvested 72.9 tonnes of potato per hectare surpassing the earlier yield record of 45 tonnes per hectare held by farmers in the Netherlands, official sources said.

All the 243 Bihar’s MLAs received a basket of organically grown potatoes last week to taste the flavour of the tuber and motivate farmers in their constituencies to adopt organic farming practice, Bihar Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh told PTI today.

Nalanda, about 80 km from capital Patna, is the native district of the CM.The minister said that the state government is motivating farmers to go for chemical fertilisers-free organic farming.

Singh said organic farming will fulfil Chief Minister Nitish Kumar’s dream of India’s second green revolution taking off from Bihar.

Nalanda is the main potato producing district in Bihar with farmers growing the crop on over 27,000 hectares.

Bihar is the third largest potato producing state after Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal.Farmers of Darvespura created a world record by achieving wet paddy yield of 22.4 tonnes per hectare and that of dry paddy at 20.16 tonnes/ha. This had surpassed the yield of 19 tonnes/ha which was recorded earlier in China.

Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar had mentioned this rare accomplishment in his written reply to a question in Parliament recently.

The record paddy production was achieved under the demonstration on System of Rice Intensification (SRI) which was organised at farmer’s field during Kharif 2011.